


Nothing Breaks Like a Heart

by deltajackdalton



Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Emotional Hurt, Heartache, Heartbreak, Hurt No Comfort, Pain, heart condition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-11-05 14:04:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17920217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deltajackdalton/pseuds/deltajackdalton
Summary: So in honor of George Eads Appreciation Week Day One: Favorite Character, I came up with this super angsty feely Jack Dalton fic on the fly because Jack Dalton is not only my favorite character George Eads portrays, but my favorite in general and I love and miss him so much and I just have a lot of feels. Not edited so there are mistakes I'm sure. Enjoy the pain. Title taken from the Miley Cyrus/Mark Ronson song of the same title, but not a song fic. (Also this is my first fic I've posted on here! Super excited about that!)





	Nothing Breaks Like a Heart

**Author's Note:**

> So in honor of George Eads Appreciation Week Day One: Favorite Character, I came up with this super angsty feely Jack Dalton fic on the fly because Jack Dalton is not only my favorite character George Eads portrays, but my favorite in general and I love and miss him so much and I just have a lot of feels. Not edited so there are mistakes I'm sure. Enjoy the pain. Title taken from the Miley Cyrus/Mark Ronson song of the same title, but not a song fic. (Also this is my first fic I've posted on here! Super excited about that!)

Jack's been gone from the Phoenix for nearly a year but it feels like an eternity. An eternity since he's seen his family and that's slowly killing him inside, he just doesn't admit it. Won't admit it. He won't tell the medical officer that he's been having a harder time breathing lately or that his head aches so badly that he can't see or the way his heart sometimes skips one, two beats before going back to normal. The new normal, his pulse wasn't this... fast when he still lived in LA. Certainly won't mention this persistent numbness in his left arm that he can't shake out no matter how hard he tries. He's leading this ops. If he can't handle it, how can he trust the other guys to keep it together?

Currently the special ops team is stationed somewhere in the Middle East, Jack's lost track of exactly where he's at, all he knows is that it's not LA. This dump of a motel that he now calls home is a long way from his own comfortable apartment that he'd give anything to get back to right now. He's here for a reason though, an important reason, he knows that. Tiberius Kovak is dangerous. He needs to be stopped for good, if they could only find the son of a bitch. It's been one step forward, two steps back ever since he was recalled. He just can't find it in himself to care anymore.

There's no chance of sleeping tonight, no chance of him getting the only break from this hell on earth even if it is just slipping in his personal hell in the form of nightmares that's been plaguing him since he got here. Nightmares are almost welcome at the point; it's the only place he can talk to his family anymore. It's been one of those days where they come so close, there's intel so credible on Kovak's location that Jack can practically see him in sights again just like the first time, but it's a dead end. Nothing but dead ends. Jack tries to keep his cool, he really does, but he's so angry -at Kovak, at his team, most of all at himself- he had to get out of there before he did something he might regret. He books it back to his motel room against his better judgement since the rest of the team is staying on a makeshift base they've set up struggling out of his tac vest and various gun holsters as soon as the door closes. He can't breathe, always feeling on the verge of choking and tonight's worse than other times. Splashing cool water on his face from the sink doesn't help, doesn't fix this soul-crushing aloneness he feels. He curses himself for not just killing the bastard the first time and being done with it so he could have stayed with his family, but this is his reality he has to live with it.

There's one bright spot in this his darkest days. His heart is pounding in his throat as his knees buckle and he slides down the wall as he pulls out a wrinkled and worn picture that he keeps in the shirt pocket over his old, tired heart. Riley gave it to him right before he left as something to remind him of his Phoenix team. Not that he needed reminding of them; he thinks about them all the time, tearing open the wounds in his soul that he knows good and well will never heal anyway. It's an older picture and kind of blurry, but he clings to it like a lifeline to better days. He remembers that day perfectly. They'd gotten back from a mission that went seven shades of south in a hurry thankfully alive and miraculously uninjured and had celebrated accordingly. At Mac's with pizza and beers and a Die Hard movie marathon that he knew no one but himself cared about, but they all stayed and watched because no one was willing to leave quite yet. Somehow they all found themselves back out on the porch in the cool night air huddled around the fire pit for warmth and Riley decided it was the perfect photo op. She and Bozer and Matty are squeezed together on one side of the shot, and Jack glances at them for a moment and lets his heart ache for missing each of them. But it's Mac that he can't take his eyes off of; the way they have their arms slung around each other loosely but at the same time, there was no force on earth that could have pried Mac out of his grasp in that moment. He stares at Mac's baby blue eyes so happy and carefree until he can't see through the blur of tears that are spilling down his cheeks any longer because he just wants to see those blue eyes in person so badly that he can't stand it and there's physically no way to get this, this hurt out.

Sure he misses all of them, this family that he somehow was lucky enough to stumble onto and pull together and make his own. He misses Matty's frosty exterior that hid a heart of gold that had been hurt too many times. He misses Bozer's wise cracks and good-natured sense of humor and even that Christmas pastrami that he'd been craving ever since the holidays came and went and he had to spend it out here in the Sandbox. Alone. He misses Riley's spirit and spit-fire attitude, and he misses watching her grow and become a stronger woman everyday. He clings to the thought that one day he might get to see her walk down the aisle at her wedding, or his hope beyond hope that she'd ask him to walk her down the aisle. She is his little girl biology be damned and oh god, does he love her with all of his Texas-sized heart that's cracked and tattered. He misses Leanna and Cage and Sarah and Elwood and a thousand other people that he never realized had impacted him the way they had until they were gone.

But most of all he misses Mac. He can't even put into words how much he misses Mac. He can't find the words to tell Mac what he means to him, how he'd do everything in his power to make him happy, how he'd follow him to hell and back if Mac only asked no questions asked. How much he loved Mac. He loved Mac more fiercely and more completely than anyone else he'd ever known before, but had never told him because he was just so damned afraid of ruining what they had together. Their friendship was more than someone that had killed and cheated and lied as Jack had even deserved in his life. He deserves a lot of things after all the bad that he's done in his life, just knowing Angus MacGyver is more blessing than he ever should have had. Loving him, it's almost more than his old ticker can bear. If he gets back to LA he'll tell Mac what he feels even if Mac doesn't feel the same way. He'll tell him that he's loved him since their first tour together, that in sixty-four days despite all Mac's quirks, because of Mac's quirks, he fell in love with him and hasn't looked back. He'll tell Mac that he's perfect and beautiful and the smartest and bravest man Jack knows. He'll tell Mac everything he's wanted Mac to know all along but never knew how to say because Jack isn't a man of words but a man of action.

Jack Dalton deserves a lot of things. The least he could do is endure the sheer agony of his heart breaking as he thinks that maybe he'll never survive this op to see his family again.


End file.
